I jumped down the last three rungs onto the steel floor below. Six or seven hard-hatted figures were huddled over the figure-eight belt where it joined the side conveyors feeding it from the holds. I strode over and shoved them aside, Bledsoe peering around my back.

Clayton Phillips was staring up at me. His body was covered with coal. The pale brown eyes were open, the square jaw clenched. Blood had dried across his freckled cheekbones. I moved the men away and bent over to peer closely at his head. Coal had mostly filled in a large hole on the left side. It was mixed with congealed blood in a reddish-black, ghastly clot.

“It’s Phillips,” Bledsoe said, his voice constricted.

“Yes. We’d better call the police. You and I have a few questions to discuss, Martin.” I turned to the group of men. “Who’s in charge down here?”

A middle-aged man with heavy jowls said he was the chief engineer.

“Make sure no one touches the body or anything else. We’ll get the police over here.”

Bledsoe followed me tamely back up the ladder to the deck and off the ship. “There’s been an accident down below,” I told the Plymouth foreman. “We’re getting the police. They won’t be unloading the rest of the coal for a while.” The foreman took us into a small office just around to the side of a long shed. I used the phone to call the Indiana State Police.

Bledsoe got into the Omega with me. We drove away from the yard in silence. I made my way back to the interstate and rode the few remaining miles over to the Indiana Dunes State Park. On a weekday afternoon, in early spring, the place was deserted. We climbed across the sand down to the shore. The only other people there were a bearded man and a sporty-looking woman with their golden retriever. The dog was swimming into the frothy waves after a large stick.

“You have a lot of explaining to do, Martin.”

He looked at me angrily. “You owe me a lot of explanations. How did Phillips get into that ship? Who blew up the Lucella? And how come you’re so quick on the spot every time disaster is about to strike Pole Star?”

“How come Mattingly flew back to Chicago on your plane?”

“Who the hell is Mattingly?”

I drew a breath. “You don’t know? Honestly?”

He shook his head.

“Then who did you send back to Chicago in your plane?”

“I didn’t.” He made an exasperated gesture. “I called Cappy as soon as I got to town and demanded the same thing of him. He insists I phoned from Thunder Bay and told him to fly this strange guy back—he said his name was Oleson. Obviously someone was impersonating me. But who and why? And since you clearly know who this guy is, you tell me.”